Pot. Dope. Weed. 420. Bud. Doobie. Toke. Even 15 years after marijuana was approved for legal medical use in Canada, the language describing it obscures, conceals and hides. Can cannabis shed its dubious and illicit past so that this compound can be looked at within a medical framework first, and a recreational one second?

The 23,500 square foot production facility in Paris, Ontario started off early in cultivation. As soon as their license to grow was granted, work began straight away. As part of a fully integrated medical marijuana and health care company, high standards must be held to carry on business under the regulations.

Over the last few years, triclosan has been the subject of much debate. Those in favour of these products hail their ability to keep bacteria at bay. Those against suggest there is no real benefit in everyday consumer home use whereas the risks -- both to humans and the environment -- are too great.

Canadians rarely want to consider amputation as the best solution to treat a condition, but for Canadians living with diabetes, this can be a reality. In some cases, even severe ones, the amputation can be prevented, shielding the patient from a long and painful recovery period.

Antiquated policies like the ban against men who have sex with men (MSM) bring into question just how progressive health and social policies are. The MSM policy mandates that even if MSM are healthy, they must abstain from intimacy for a pre-determined period in order to donate their blood to those who need it.

It's difficult for those with chronic medical conditions to be dependent on prescription drugs but that becomes unbearable when they also have to worry about their drug supplies running out. There is a world wide shortage of many drugs which governments are seemingly doing little to alleviate. The current Canadian crisis is impacting those with epilepsy and many with bipolar disorder. Health Canada's response appears to be callous disregard.

The history of research, including research in Canada, shows that very serious harms may be suffered by persons taking part in research. The rules are not perfect, and they continue to be refined when tragedies do occur, but prior review and oversight has proved a powerful corrective to make research safer for human subjects. The problem is that these research protections don't apply to everyone doing research on people in Canada -- and they should.

If Canada is to implement national pharmacare, surely we want to know more about the drugs we'll be paying for. To this end, we must tackle a pre-existing challenge: we must open up the evidence our drug regulator houses concerning drug safety and effectiveness. For decades Health Canada has kept that information confidential at the behest of drug manufacturers. This practice limits the ongoing evaluation of a drug's safety and effectiveness and, in turn, provincial and territorial governments' decision-making about which drugs to pay for, not to mention physicians and patients who make decisions about which drugs to prescribe and take.